Send me email updates about messages I've received
on the site and the latest news from The CafeMom Team.By signing up, you certify that
you are female and accept the Terms of Service and have read the
Privacy Policy.

how is this NOT enough?

In his first two years in office, President Barack Obama will increase annual federal welfare spending by one-third from $522 billion to $697 billion. The combined two-year increase will equal almost $263 billion ($88.2 bil­lion in FY 2009 plus $174.6 billion in FY 2010). After adjusting for inflation, this increase is two and a half times greater than any previous increase in federal welfare spending in U.S. history. As a share of the economy, annual fed­eral welfare spending will rise by roughly 1.2 percent of GDP.

Under President Obama, government will spend more on welfare in a single year than President George W. Bush spent on the war in Iraq during his entire presidency. According to the Congressional Research Service, the cost of the Iraq war through the end of the Bush Administration was around $622 billion. By contrast, annual federal and state means-tested welfare spending will reach $888 billion in FY 2010. Federal welfare spending alone will equal $697 billion in that year.

While campaigning for the presidency, Obama lamented that "the war in Iraq is costing each household about $100 per month." Applying the same standard to means-tested welfare spending reveals that welfare will cost each household $560 per month in 2009 and $638 per month in 2010.

Answer by
Anonymous
at 7:27 PM on Jan. 25, 2010

Most of Obama's increases in welfare spending are permanent expansions of the welfare state, not temporary increases in response to the current recession. According to the long-term spending plans set forth in Obama's FY 2010 budget, combined federal and state spending will not drop significantly after the recession ends. In fact, by 2014, welfare spending is likely to equal $1 trillion per year.

According to President Obama's budget projections, federal and state welfare spending will total $10.3 trillion over the next 10 years (FY 2009 to FY 2018). This spending will equal $250,000 for each person currently living in poverty in the U.S., or $1 million for a poor family of four.

The best-known and most influential right-wing think tank, the Heritage Foundation owes much of its success to savvy marketing and PR and the generous donations of right-wing benefactors, foundations and wealthy corporations. The foundation boasts about its influence on Capitol Hill yet insists that it does not "lobby."

The Heritage Foundation posted a paid advertisement yesterday on YouTube's homepage claiming that in the debate over the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) workers only hear "the union organizer's side." The infomercial tells viewers that worker enthusiasm for union membership drops off from the time of the initial card check to the time of electing a union, but it leaves out the tactics management uses to scare and cajole workers not to join a union in the first place. The Heritage Foundation deployed 21st Century "new media" technology to make its case for a return to 19th Century labor practices.

Answer by
Anonymous
at 7:36 PM on Jan. 25, 2010

We need for all the people who get some type of PA to keep voting Dimocrat!

Then look at it this way; GWB spent in 8 years enough money to cause the national debt to be $1.3 trillion. (remember - it took 8 years) BO has spent in ONE year enough to increase the national debt $1.3 trillion. It took BO one year to accomplish what it took GWB to do in 8 years and yes, he was fighting a war. Well, so is BO, and he doubled our debt. There is no way in good conscientiousness you can defend and justify that kind of spending. You really can't continue to say "Bush did the same". Well, yes, but GWB took 2,922 days (8 years, almost a decade). It took BO 365 days - not exactly comparable now is it?